Joseph Lyle Menéndez (born January 10, 1968) and Erik Galen Menéndez (born November 27, 1970) are American brothers from Beverly Hills, California, who were convicted in a high-profile criminal trial in 1994 for the 1989 murder by shotgun of their wealthy parents, entertainment executive José and his wife Mary ("Kitty"). Though initially not regarded as suspects, the duo attracted the attention of authorities as they spent their deceased parents' fortune lavishly within weeks of the murders.

During the trial, the brothers claimed that the murders stemmed from years of sexual and psychological abuse that they had suffered at the hands of their parents. They were first tried by two different juries (one for each brother). Both juries deadlocked which led to a mistrial. For the second trial, Erik and Lyle were judged by the same jury, who rejected the defense's claim. The brothers were sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

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José Enrique Menéndez, Lyle and Erik's father, was born in Havana, Cuba. At the age of 16, he moved to the United States following the upheaval of the Cuban Revolution.[1] While attending Southern Illinois University, he met Mary Louise "Kitty" Andersen. The two married in 1963 and moved to New York City where José earned a degree in accounting from Queens College.[2] While living in New York City the couple began a family. Their elder son, Joseph Lyle Menéndez, who went by his middle name, was born January 10, 1968.[3] Kitty quit her job teaching after Lyle was born. The family then moved to New Jersey, where Kitty gave birth to their second son, Erik, November 27, 1970 in Gloucester Township, New Jersey.[4][5][4]In New Jersey, both brothers attended Princeton Day School.[6]

In 1986, José's career as a corporate executive took the family to Calabasas, California, where the boys lived during their adolescence.[4][6] The following year, Erik began attending high school in Calabasas, earning average grades and showing a remarkable talent for tennis, ranking 44th in the nation for 18 and under players.[7] Lyle attended Princeton University but was placed on academic probation for poor grades and discipline. After allegations of plagiarism surfaced during his freshman year, he was suspended for a year.

On August 20, 1989, Lyle, 21, and Erik, 18, killed their parents.[8] The murders occurred that evening in the den of the family's home in Beverly Hills, at 722 North Elm Drive.

Neighbors later reported hearing loud bangs around 10 p.m but dismissed them, as they thought local kids were playing with firecrackers. José and Kitty Menéndez were spending a quiet night watching television on the couch when their sons, armed with shotguns, entered the den. José was shot point-blank in the back of the head with a Mossberg 12-gauge shotgun.[9] Kitty, awakened by the shots, got up from the couch and was shot in the leg as she ran towards the hallway. She slipped on her own blood and fell. While on the ground, she was shot several times in the arm, chest, and face, leaving her unrecognizable. Both José and Kitty were shot in the kneecap, in an attempt to make the murders appear related to organized crime.[10][11] At 11:47 p.m., when the brothers returned home, Lyle telephoned 9-1-1 and cried, "Somebody killed my parents!" The brothers told the police they had been at the movie theater watching Batman at the time of the crime. Afterward, they said they went to the annual "Taste of L.A." festival at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. Despite being considered suspects, the police did not order the brothers to undergo gunshot residue tests to learn whether they had recently used a firearm.[12] A lack of evidence also prevented the police from looking into the brothers more thoroughly.

In the months after the murders, the brothers spent money lavishly, adding to investigators' suspicions that they were involved with their parents' deaths.[13] Lyle bought an expensive Rolex watch, a Porsche Carrera, and Chuck's Spring Street Cafe,[14] a Buffalo wing restaurant in Princeton, New Jersey. Erik hired a full-time tennis coach and competed in a series of pro tournaments in Israel. They left the North Elm Drive mansion unoccupied opting to live in adjoining condos in nearby Marina del Rey.[15] They drove around Los Angeles in their late mother's Mercedes-Benz SL convertible, dined expensively, and went on overseas trips to the Caribbean and to London.[16] It is estimated that Lyle and Erik spent $700,000 in the months between the murders and their arrests.[17]

Erik confessed to the murders to his psychologist, Dr. L. Jerome Oziel. After being threatened by Lyle, Oziel told his mistress, Judalon Smyth, about the killings. Smyth then tipped off the police as to the brothers' involvement.[18] Lyle was arrested near the mansion on March 8, 1990, after police received information that he was preparing to flee California. Erik, who was in Israel, surrendered himself three days later upon returning to Los Angeles. Both were remanded without bail and they were kept separate from each other.[19]

In August 1990, Judge James Albrecht ruled that the tapes of conversations between Erik and his psychologist were admissible because Lyle had voided doctor–patient privilege by threatening physical harm against Oziel. That ruling was appealed, delaying the proceedings for two years. After the ruling was initially overturned on appeal, the Supreme Court of California declared in August 1992 that several tapes were admissible, but not the tape of Erik discussing the murders.[20] After that decision, a Los Angeles Countygrand jury issued indictments in December 1992, charging the brothers with the murder of their parents.[21]

The Menéndez brothers and the murders of their parents became national sensations when Court TV broadcast the trial in 1993. The younger brother's defense attorney, Leslie Abramson, became famous for her flamboyant defense, alleging that the brothers were driven to murder by a lifetime of abuse at the hands of their parents, including sexual abuse at the hands of their father, who was described as a cruel, callous perfectionist and a pedophile. Kitty was portrayed as a selfish, mentally unstable alcoholic and drug addict, who had enabled her husband's abuses and was also sometimes violent towards them.[22] The trial ended with two deadlocked juries. The voting jurors went along sex lines as men on both juries voted for a conviction.

Los Angeles County District AttorneyGil Garcetti announced immediately that the brothers would be retried. The second trial was somewhat less publicized, partly because Judge Stanley Weisberg refused to allow cameras in the courtroom.[23] During the second trial, Weisberg did not allow much of the defense to testify about the sexual abuse claims,[24] and also would not allow the jury to vote on manslaughter charges rather than murder charges.[25]

Both brothers were convicted of two counts of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder. In the penalty phase of the trial, the jury chose sentences for the brothers of life in prison without the possibility of parole rather than death. The jury later said that the abuse defense was never a factor in its deliberations and that it rejected the death penalty because neither brother had a felony record or a history of violence. Unlike the juries in the previous trials, the jury in the penalty phase unanimously rejected the defense's theory that the brothers killed their parents out of fear. It is believed that the brothers had committed the murders with the intent to gain control over their father's considerable wealth.[26]

On July 2, 1996, Judge Weisberg sentenced the two to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Judge Weisberg sentenced the brothers to consecutive sentences for the murders and the charges of conspiracy to commit murder. As had been done during their pretrial detention, the California Department of Corrections separated the Menéndez brothers and sent them to different prisons. Both brothers were classified as maximum-security inmates and were segregated from other prisoners.

During the penalty phase of their murder trial, defense lawyer Abramson allegedly directed a defense witness, Dr. William Vicary, to edit his notes, but the district attorney's office decided that it would not conduct a criminal investigation.[27] Both brothers filed motions for a mistrial, claiming that they suffered irreparable damage in the penalty phase as a result of suggestions of possible misconduct and ineffective representation by Abramson.

On February 27, 1998, the California Court of Appeal upheld the murder convictions, and on May 28, 1998, the Supreme Court of California voted to uphold the murder convictions and the 'life without parole' sentences, with none of the Supreme Court justices voting to review the case.[28]

Both brothers filed habeas corpus petitions with the Supreme Court of California, which were denied in 1999. Having exhausted their appeal remedies in state court, the brothers filed separate habeas corpus petitions in the United States District Court. On March 4, 2003, a magistrate judge recommended the denial of the petitions.[citation needed] The district court adopted such recommendation. The brothers then appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. On September 7, 2005, a three-judge panel issued their ruling affirming the denial of both brothers' petitions for habeas corpus.[29]

Since entering prison, both brothers have married even though California does not allow conjugal visits for those convicted of murder or for those serving life sentences.

On July 2, 1996, Lyle married longtime pen pal Anna Eriksson, a former model, in a ceremony attended by Abramson and Lyle's aunt, Marta Menéndez, and presided over by Judge Nancy Brown. The two were divorced on April 1, 2001,[28] after Eriksson reportedly discovered that Lyle was "cheating" on her by writing to another woman. In November 2003, Lyle, then 35, married Rebecca Sneed, a 33-year-old magazine editor from Sacramento, at a ceremony in a supermax prison visiting area of Mule Creek State Prison. Lyle and Rebecca had reportedly known each other for about ten years prior to their engagement.[30][31]

In 1997, Erik was reportedly married in a telephone ceremony at Folsom State Prison. In June 1999, Erik, 28, married Tammi Ruth Saccoman, 37, at Folsom State Prison in a prison waiting room. Tammi later stated, "Our wedding cake was a Twinkie. We improvised. It was a wonderful ceremony until I had to leave. That was a very lonely night."[32][33] In an interview with ABC News in October 2005, she described her relationship with Erik as "something that I've dreamed about for a long time. And it's just something very special that I never thought that I would ever have."[34] In 2005, Tammi also self-published a book, They Said We'd Never Make It – My Life With Erik Menéndez, but she said on Larry King Live that Erik "did a lot of editing on the book."[35]

In a 2005 interview with People magazine, she stated, "Not having sex in my life is difficult, but it's not a problem for me. I have to be physically detached, and I'm emotionally attached to Erik.... My family does not understand. When it started to get serious, some of them just threw up their hands." Tammi also noted that she and her 10-year-old daughter drive the 150 miles (240 km) every weekend to see Erik, and her daughter refers to him as her "Earth Dad."[32]

Regarding his sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole, Erik has stated: "Tammi is what gets me through. I can't think about the sentence. When I do, I do it with a great sadness and a primal fear. I break into a cold sweat. It's so frightening I just haven't come to terms with it."[32]

Under the terms of the sentences for their multiple crimes, the brothers are expected to spend the remainder of their lives behind bars. According to Erik, on the same Larry King Live episode, he and his elder brother have not spoken to each other for more than ten years.[35][not in citation given]

In late 2017, A&E aired a five-part documentary, titled The Menendez Murders: Erik Tells All, in which Erik, via telephone, recalls the murders and the aftermath. The series also provides never-before-seen photos and new interviews with prosecutors, law enforcement, close family, friends and medical experts.[37]

As of February 2018, after a tough six year process with the Corrections Department. Both men have been granted permission to be in the same prison facility. Lyle Menendez requested and has been moved to Richard J. Donovan Correctional Facility and would be expected to meet his brother Erik for the first time since 1996.

The Menéndez brothers were recently featured in a 2017 documentary titled Truth and Lies: The Menéndez Brothers — American Sons, American Murderers on ABC, as well as on an episode of Snapped in 2016. The murders are the subjects of multiple docu-dramas, including the Lifetime movie Menendez: Blood Brothers (2017), as well as the 1994 television film Menendez: A Killing in Beverly Hills on CBS, and Honor Thy Father and Mother: The True Story of the Menendez Murders on Fox the same year. The media hype surrounding the first trial was parodied in the 1996 dark comedy film The Cable Guy. The Menéndez brothers were also the subject of the weekly satire podcast The Last Podcast on the Left in 2016. They were also depicted in the film Natural Born Killers.

In an episode of NBC's 30 Rock titled "Gavin Volure", Tracy Jordan is worried that his children are going to "Menendez" him because they are acting strangely, going as far as to use a Japanese sex doll of his likeness to fool his children, and eventually, Gavin Volure in the episode's conclusion; in another episode ("Nothing Left to Lose"), main character Jenna Maroney is revealed to have a tattoo on her forearm that says "Free Lyle Menendez."

In a season 4 episode of Arrested Development, "Queen B.", Lucille Bluth tells her husband that "bad things happen when brothers collude” before a brief montage shows pictures of brothers who are notorious for crimes, such as the Menendez Brothers.

The 1995 album Raza Odiada by extreme metal band Brujeria includes a song titled "Hermanos Menéndez", a retelling of the Menendez Brothers story.

In season 2, episode 9 of Dharma & Greg Dharma tells Jane that "Lyle and Erik got sunburned", referring to her breasts. She explains that it was "Greg's idea. 'Cause they're a coupla killers."

In an episode of ABC's Fresh Off the Boat, the topic of the Menéndez brothers and how they "didn't get away with it" came up while Jessica was talking to Evan about going to St. Orlando Private School.

In the pilot episode of Gilmore Girls, Lorelei tells Rory during an argument that she is expected to at least be civil through dinner, and on the way home she can "pull a Menendez."

In his 2008 stand-up comedy show It's Bad For Ya, George Carlin makes a brief allusion to the Menéndez brothers, in a segment intended to debunk the idea that after death parents can somehow help their children spiritually in their various endeavours, which he presents as unrealistic and illogical, saying: "Suppose you kill your parents ... would they help you? I'll guarantee you Mr. and Mrs. Menéndez are not helping those two boys!"

In a 2015 episode of NBC's Saturday Night Live, a music video sketch titled "First Got Horny 2 U" chronicles female cast members' absurd sexual attractions to pop culture figures. In the song, cast member Vanessa Bayer sings of an attraction to the Menéndez brothers, with the verse: "Okay, now it's me, mine is pretty bad/It's those guys who killed their mom and dad/The Menéndez Brothers, they were cute and young/I think Erik was the hotter one."

The Law & Order season 1 episode 19 "The Serpent's Tooth" is also based on the case.

HLN launched the new series "How it Really Happened with Hill Harper" with the Menéndez brothers story. The episode is titled "The Menéndez Brothers: Murder in Beverly Hills", Series 1; Episode 1, original air date: January 27, 2017. The episode ends with a telephone interview of Erik Menéndez from jail with Chris Cuomo.[42]